Thanks, I'm glad you appreciated where I was coming from with my post.
I will agree that the Dent Act was something of a Dues Ex Machina, but in my opinion it was a necessary dues ex machina. The problem for me is the that idea of Gotham having a dead heroic DA is a bit abstract. It's a hard pill to swallow that Gotham would automatically improve just because he was dead now. Did Gotham improve after their "first family", the Waynes' were murdered? Nope, it just slid further into corruption. So I think the idea of Dent's legacy actually affecting the law in Gotham to the point where it's approaching a police state was an interesting way of tipping the scales and taking an abstract idea/hope and giving it some definition. I was legitimately worried that about the Dent legacy being handled in a wishy washy way, so although the Dent Act is very on the nose and convenient, I still like it because for me it was a good way of continuing Dent's legacy in the story even after his death (since he couldn't be back in the third part to continue the "freaks" story as perhaps planned once upon a time prior to TDK).
But the thing is, regardless- we're only arguing about stuff that didn't happen on screen. Even if he had been Batman for the 8 years, quietly putting out fires and stopping freaks before they rise to power (I don't really know how he'd do that all completely unnoticed...he certainly can't go riding around on any of his vehicles anymore to do that), it's still just stuff that is backstory. And if Batman had been able to stop all freaks in Gotham completely unnoticed, without alerting the GCPD and the citizens of Gotham thinking that they're living in peace time...then I think that's just as convenient as the Dent Act. Then again, these larger than life characters like Batman and Joker are so extreme that they are almost walking D.E.Ms. Maybe that's exactly why I'm okay with the Dent Act. It's a D.E.M., but it only exists because of an extreme choice made by Batman. It's something he indadvertedly wills into existence, and I guess I like the idea of Batman's actions and decisions having so much power that they actually transform the fabric of the city. It's a different expression of his omnipotence I suppose. Sure they name the act after Dent, but Bruce still tells Gordon "We won", after all.
If we were gonna get a story about Batman doing his job while being hunted, there would've been drama there to exploit...how does Gordon deal with it, how does Gotham react etc. And therefore, saying "that happened", while skipping over it would make us feel like we missed out on a big chunk of the story. My point here is that, even if that all happened as part of the TDKR backstory, would that have even constituted TDKR following up on the rise of the freaks plot thread? To me it'd only be paying lip service to the idea while pushing the story in a new direction. So it's the same end result ultimately.
Every story has contrivances. I think this is more a matter of you and others having issues with the story they chose to tell than anything else problematic with the film. I know you disagree, but that is consistently what I've observed these discussions tending to come down to. If you had gotten more of the story you were hoping for or one that you were more pleased with, I bet you'd go a lot easier on all the contrivances that allowed it to exist.
When I said Batman would stop freaks without Gotham noticing, what I meant was that Batman would stop them without Gotham knowing that it was Batman who stopped them but Gordon because Gotham would think Batman is a bad guy. I also didn't mean that Gotham wouldn't be aware of the other freaks. By a freak not reaching Joker status, what I mean is that no freak would get the entire city evacuated again like Joker did. I'm also not saying this is the best way to do it. You asked me of alternatives and this was the best one that I could come up with (and I still think it's more believable than the Dent Act) but I also said that I trust Nolan would've found a way to make it work.
Funny thing you mention that about how TDKR would deal with the manhunt. Back in '08, Goyer said that the next Batman movie would've been about Gordon and the GCPD hunting down Batman and would show how Gordon has to deal with that. Yes, there is drama there to explore but no one says that we needed to skip over all that drama by having an 8 year time gap. You seem to be under the belief that there just
had to be that time gap (which is fine if you are). You seem to be asking how you could've had most of the important aspects from TDKR like the 8 year time gap and Bruce quitting still be there while still having the important stuff set up from BB and TDK still in there. My answer to that would be to not worry about that and to just tell a story that naturally flows with the last film.
The problem with the Dent Act is that it does not fit the politics from BB and TDK. All 3 films have contrivances but the ones in BB & TDK were for the most part just standard movie contrivances that went against the science and logic of our world but that you had to give a pass to because they were small things every movie has. Examples off the top of my head are the microwave machine that is strong enough to vaporize the water in steel pipes but not the water in your body, Batman driving a vehicle of his own company on the streets of Gotham with no one suspecting anything, the cops losing a guy that is driving a tank on the road, no one getting killed during that chase scene in BB, the Joker robbing that bank in the opening scene in broad daylight with no problem, the Joker planting bombs on the boats without them being found, and the list goes on. The Dent Act is a different type of contrivance and one that does not work in this universe. One thing that was
very realistic about BB and TDK (mostly about TDK) was their politics. Everything you saw in BB and TDK in terms of how Gotham's politics and policies worked were very accurate to how a real life's city's politics and policies would function minus them letting a vigilante operate in their city. When you establish such ultra-realistic politics in your universe, you destroy all chances of having an act like the Dent Act work in your universe.
Also, I don't believe I wouldn't criticize the Dent Act even if I enjoyed TDKR more. I found out about the Dent Act before the film even came out and just the concept and premise of it alone didn't sit well with me.
There have always been things Nolan did in his franchise that I did not like due to personal preferences. Examples off the top of my head are Scarecrow being underused, Scarecrow not being the main villain of BB & Ra's not being left for a sequel, lack of scenes showing Bruce getting detective training as well as not enough scenes of him doing detective work, killing off someone as important to the Batman mythos as Two-Face, having Rachel Dawes as opposed to a character like Vicki Vale or Julie Madison from the comics, hindering any chances of this Batman being part of a shared universe, etc. These are all things that I would've preferred to see but it doesn't take away from the movie because I know (or at least I think I know) the difference between personal preferences and actual flaws in the story. Now I do admit that there are
some things in TDKR that I did personally did not like that they weren't there but I still counted as flaws the film has but all of them are examples of TDKR going against the status quo in the first 2 films for no excuse whatsoever. Examples are Gotham lacking a voice, the main villain(s) lacking a philosophy to counter Batman's, and dropping the theme of insanity (both BB and TDK were about the relationship between fear and insanity while TDKR is only about fear). These things have been consistent and the norm throughout the franchise until TDKR so while they don't take away from the movie if you look at it from a stand-alone point of view, they do from a franchise point of view.
t:.
. You are right about TDK's ending. I remember saying when the film first came out that even if there was no sequel, I wouldn't mind due to the epic ending.
